Whether you want to butcher your
own meat chickens or are simply keeping hens as farm animals
for eggs in order to manage your flock efficiently you will
at times need to kill at least some of your chickens.
This page gives you a step by step description of how to
kill a chicken as humanly as possible. There are other
methods used to kill chickens but I have found my technique
to be quite effective, especially if you only intend to kill
two or three chickens.

Holding a chicken upside by the feet in an upside down
position quickly pacifies the bird allowing it to be carried
easily.

You will need:-

A sturdy block of wood to act as a chopping block

Sharp hatchet (small axe)A large axe will do but I find that a
hatchet
is better as it is easier to wield.

Large plastic containerA 60 litre rubbish bin is ideal.

Plastic bin linerThis is optional, it is only needed if
you are going to dispose of the chicken in the garbage bin or you intend
to pluck and butcher the chicken after you have killed it.

When and where to kill
chickens

Chickens should never be killed in front of the rest of the flock.
Always move any chickens you intend to kill to a place out of site of the chicken run.
For me that is usually the garage; not only is it out of sight of
the rest of the flock but
it is well lit due to the garage lightning.

I normally kill my chickens at night. Chickens have no night
vision which makes it both easy to collect the chickens (they will
all be roosting in one place instead of walking around the chicken
run as they would be in the daytime) and less likely that the rest of the chickens
will realise that some of their brethren are
being taken. Removing the chickens you intend to kill at night
minimises the disruption to the rest of the flock.

preparing to kill chickens

Before collecting the first chicken to be killed set the chopping
block and hatchet on the ground where you intend to kill it
with the plastic bin right next to it. If you are using a
plastic bin liner then insert it in the bin.

carrying a chicken

Once you have selected the chicken that you intend to kill pick it
up by its feet and flip it upside down. Chickens
carried upright will cry out in distress and attempt to fly away but
once they are flipped upside down they will become quiet within a few
seconds and can be easily carried to where you want to kill them.

Killing the chicken

While firmly holding onto the chicken's feet with one hand grasp the chicken's upper neck
just below the head with the other hand.

Draw the chicken's feet up to your chest while at the same time
turning its head and upper neck so it is at a
right angle to the rest of the neck and body.

Illustration showing the position of
the chicken's head and feet as you strike downwards to break the
chicken's neck.

Firmly strike downwards with the hand holding the
chicken's neck until the arm is
straight.Usually there is a cracking sound indicating that the neck is
broken, though not always.

Immediately place the chicken's neck and head on the
chopping block and strike the neck with the axe until blood is
drawn.There is no need to cut the chicken's head
off, all that is needed is for blood to be flowing.

Dangle the chicken by the feet in the plastic bin until the
bird stops rigorously flapping its wings.

Once the flapping has reached a point when
the wings are only moving feebly drop the chicken into the bin.If you have more than one chicken to kill
you can now go and get the next chicken. By the time you
return with the second chicken the first chicken will be dead.

disposing of chicken
carcasses

There are three options for disposing of chicken carcasses.

If you intend to butcher (pluck, gut and cut up) the chicken then
proceed to do so as soon as possible.

Dispose of in the garbage bin. If using this method
line the plastic bin with a bin liner, then all you have to do is tie
off the liner and place it in the garbage bin.

Bury the chicken under a fruit tree.This is my preferred method of disposing of a
chicken carcass If I am not going to eat it as carcasses makes good
fertiliser. But make sure you bury it deep enough so that a dog or
fox cannot dig it up. After burying a chicken carcass I always
place a sheet of iron weighed down with bricks on top of the burial site
to insure this does not happen.